


these strange steps

by pepijr



Category: GOT7
Genre: Angst, Botanist Jaebum, Longing, M/M, Photographer Jinyoung, Pianist Wonpil, ghost au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-14
Updated: 2018-04-14
Packaged: 2019-04-22 16:27:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,221
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14312646
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pepijr/pseuds/pepijr
Summary: It takes two years for Jaebum's life to flash before his eyes.





	these strange steps

**Author's Note:**

  * For [indoorrug](https://archiveofourown.org/users/indoorrug/gifts).



> this is for cici!
> 
> cheers!

He wakes up a few meters from the motorcycle, strewn across the entrance to the highway. The police haven’t shown up yet, and the ambulance is only a wail in the distance. He moves closer to the wreck and sees himself, his body mangled, his legs twisted at impossible angles. Blood pools under his helmet, but without light, it looks like a shadow. A shadow that has started to leak past the edges of his body, and now grows beneath him, threatens to swallow him whole. A few steps away, he finds his backpack torn open. A box of ice cream spills from its mouth, and, forced open, it melts against the road. 

Seeing as there’s nothing else to do, he looks at the city’s skyline glittering against a violet sky. He starts to walk home. 

When he arrives at the apartment, the sun is peeking out from the horizon. Light spills in through closed curtains and drawn blinds, and Jaebum stands at the door of their room. The entire place is bathed in a dull blue that does away with shadows, but not entirely. It stretches them until the bed and furniture are at once lit and unlit. Buried in the dark, but inching out of it. 

Jinyoung stretches and yawns in bed, and Jaebum, smiling, leans against the doorframe.

“You were right,” he says, “That motorcycle is death on wheels. I tried to get you some of your favorite ice cream, but it spilled on the way over here.”

Jinyoung sits up. He doesn’t look in Jaebum’s direction. He gazes, instead, into the corner of the room. His eyes are still swollen with sleep. When he yawns again, Jaebum can make out the glimmer of Jinyoung’s teary eyes. 

“I’m sorry we fought,” Jaebum continues, “But I want you to know I didn’t ride my bike drunk. I waited, like I told you. I waited until I was sober again. I went to the little corner store, you remember the one? With the little candles at the register? I bought some ice cream and tried to get home fast. I didn’t want it to melt.” 

Still, Jinyoung does not look his way. He swings his legs over the edge of the bed and stands up. He stretches his arms above his head and his entire body curves. Then he makes his way to the door. 

“Come on, Jinyoung,” he murmurs, “Don’t be mad at me.” 

Jinyoung looks at him and Jaebum stands upright, straightens his posture. He tries to look as forgivable as he can and stretches his arms wide, open. Jinyoung could never resist hugs, could never resist touch, and Jaebum takes advantage. So when Jinyoung comes closer, leaning forward a little, still tired, Jaebum knows he’s won. 

Except Jinyoung keeps walking. Even when he gets close, even as Jaebum’s arms close around him, Jinyoung walks straight through. Jaebum, stunned, turns around and traces Jinyoung’s path into their kitchen. He opens his mouth to speak but then he hears a sharp cry behind him. He turns, and on their bed is Jaebum’s mother. She’s in a hospital gown, stretched straight on the bed with a baby in her arms. The baby wails and wails, weakly, softly, but the longer it stays in her arms, the calmer it gets until there is quiet. The apartment fills with a heavenly hush. Jaebum stares, his jaw slack, his eyes wide. A disembodied voice floats in from the side, and his mother looks up with a smile. 

“I’ll name him Jaebum,” she says, then, quietly, looking down at the round face wrapped in a warm bundle, she tells him, “You’re Jaebum. My Jaebum.” 

Something clatters in the kitchen, something metal that bounces once, twice. The ringing is metallic, and it swarms in the air, slips into Jaebum’s ears until it’s all he can hear. A blanket of noise, pierced only by a small, tiny cry. When he goes to investigate, he finds Jinyoung sitting on the floor. Tears stream down his cheeks; a pan sits next to him upside down, and he holds a phone to his ear. He keeps whispering, but Jaebum can’t make out the sound. He steps closer and closer, close enough that he hears each murmured “no” fall softly in the air, like feathers sailing to the ground. 

\--

After that morning in the kitchen, time stops moving the same way. Jaebum leaves to visit his mother, his sister. He visits a few old friends, he even goes to see how his dad takes the news. And when he returns, Jinyoung has moved to the couch, his body quivering with each sob. He realizes it’s only been a few hours. 

He goes to sit next to Jinyoung. He closes his eyes, and when he opens them, an entire week has flown by. He knows because Jinyoung opens the door and steps inside in an old suit, the one he wears only for special occasions. Jaebum stands to tell Jinyoung how handsome he looks, despite how drowsy his face is, how swollen his eyes are. Despite how dark the circles under them are, despite each shape and curve on him looking weighed down and heavy. But Jinyoung walks past him, and Jaebum doesn’t have a chance to speak. When he tries to follow, Jinyoung is walking out of their room again, in another outfit, another morning. He heads towards the door and steps out. Jaebum takes a step in that direction, and Jinyoung comes back in, dressed differently, with a different day spilling in from outside. 

He learns, too, that his sense of touch is gone. He cannot feel himself breathe, cannot feel his heartbeat. Standing in the sun does not warm him, standing in the shade does not cool him. 

He tries to test the limits. He climbs the stairs of their apartment complex, and when he reaches the top, he climbs to the roof. He stands over the ledge of the building, not a terribly tall height, but enough to make an impact. Enough for him to feel. He jumps off and the ground rushes up to meet him. But a few breaths from hitting the ground, time slows, and his body, by its own accord, floats gently, twisting until he’s standing upright. His feet touch the ground, or give the illusion of being on the ground. He can no longer tell the difference. 

Two weeks after his death, he lays on his side of the bed and watches Jinyoung grapple with grief. He cries, mostly. Sobs, sometimes. He weeps for what seems like long, exhausting hours. Soon, his eyes close and Jaebum is sure he’s asleep. He wishes he could tell Jinyoung that it’s okay, that he remains, neither in this world or the next. That he watches over him, that he wants him to be happy again, as happy as when they first met. 

But Jinyoung has fallen asleep, so Jaebum reaches over the bed, brushes his thumb against his cheek. He wipes away a stray tear and Jinyoung’s eyes fly open. He sits up, suddenly, and looks around, out of breath. He sniffles once, his entire body calms. Then he perks up, just lightly. His eyebrows push together, his lips pout, and his eyes look hopeful. His voice is small when it climbs up his chest, when it lingers in his throat, escapes in a quiet glide, like a rowboat out at sea. 

“Jaebum?” 

He no longer feels pain, no, but he can hear it in the distance, like rolling thunder. He can hear its echo, its thud, the sound swarming through the sky to meet him in their room. The sound of danger, of a struggle, of a bird thrashing against its cage, wildly, madly. Desperately trying to survive. 

\--

Without any physical sensation of his own, Jaebum is left to wonder what Jinyoung feels when he sleeps. 

Sometimes he sleeps on his stomach and Jaebum, curled up next to him, watches his body sway with each breath. His fingers glide over the expanse of Jinyoung’s back, jump from the birthmark beneath his right shoulder blade to the grooves of his spine that rise against his skin like pebbles. He traces the shape of bones and he follows the curve of it down to the dimples on his lower back. He fits his thumbs there, tries to remember their warmth, the feeling of coming together, lines against lines, curves against curves. 

Then he goes lower and over Jinyoung’s underwear. He lets his palms rest against the curve of his bottom, lets his fingertips drag over its shape. Then they move south, slide between his thighs, the smooth skin there. 

In the dark of the room, he tries to make out each individual hair that lines his outer thigh, tries to catch sight of every beam of light that strikes them. When it’s too dark to see, he tries to feel his way, presses his fingers against his skin hoping that maybe this night, maybe this time, if he’s careful enough, he’ll feel Jinyoung’s skin pressing back against his fingers. 

Sometimes he pushes too hard, too deep, and Jinyoung stirs and moves and ends up on his back, his stomach facing up. And Jaebum is obliged to study him again, with a single finger sliding over the ribs poking out beneath his chest, the dip of skin, the small mounds of muscle at his stomach. He fiddles with the hair around his navel and he leans forward until he can press his ear to Jinyoung’s chest. He doesn’t hear them, but he imagines Jinyoung’s veins as an endless system of canals, flowing to and from his heart, carrying life in a quiet murmur of blood. He imagines the rest of his body dancing to the rhythm of his lungs. His bones are old, sturdy buildings, architecture that creaks but never gives way. 

Still, in this world, Jinyoung is able to make him wonder, to make him dream. To leave him in awe as he presses a single kiss to Jinyoung’s chest. For a second, the room warms, the shadows lighten, and the entire world starts to orbit around them but then Jinyoung is shifting again and the emptiness comes rushing back. 

And so the weeks fly by. 

\--

Jinyoung keeps a picture of Jaebum in a small wooden box under their bed. Jaebum knows because every Sunday Jinyoung pulls it out and empties its contents on the bed.

There is a polaroid picture of them from when they’d met in college. Jaebum is still blond in it, and Jinyoung’s hair is cut across the middle of his forehead. It’s from their second date, he remembers. They had McDonald’s on an old blanket in the park next to their school and called it a picnic. Their friend had come by to tease them, had snapped the picture. In it, Jaebum has his arm draped over Jinyoung’s small shoulders. Jinyoung has his hands propped up, his fingers stretched in neat peace signs. 

Jinyoung runs his fingers over it, lingers over Jaebum, then sets the picture down on the bed. From the box he fishes out a small paper fortune from the cookie they shared on their fourth date, he takes out a cheap plastic ring from their sixth. He takes out a receipt from the dinner of their first anniversary, too, and sets it next to the baseball they’d found when they went hunting for their apartment. He lays out each object carefully, religiously, as if a quiet form of worship. 

Then Jinyoung brings out his rosary and kneels next to the bed. His elbows sink into the mattress. He closes his eyes, wraps the rosary around his fingers and prays. He mutters under his breath what Jaebum imagines to be blessings for everyone Jinyoung knows, for everyone he loves. For him, even. 

Jaebum kneels next to him and crosses his arms, closes his eyes. He tries to see what Jinyoung sees, but when his eyes close, all he finds is a boundless dark and an infinite hush. It’s wide, empty. Frightening in ways he can’t recognize, so he opens his eyes and notices a figure kneeled next to Jinyoung. 

A child, he realizes, no older than four. The closer he leans in, the more he recognizes himself. The boy -- the four-year-old Jaebum -- looks at Jinyoung curiously. He mimics the posture of his hands, though he doesn’t attempt to pray. He just stares at Jinyoung with wide, expectant eyes. Then he looks at Jaebum and smiles. The doorbell thunders through the apartment and Jinyoung jumps up. The boy vanishes, and Jaebum is left alone to watch Jinyoung scramble to stuff everything back in the box so he can toss it under his pillow. He runs to answer the door and welcomes his mother. 

Each time she comes, she forces Jinyoung to move more of Jaebum’s things out of the way. A “purge” she calls it, a “cleanse” to help him move on, but Jinyoung, and by extension Jaebum, hates it. 

She attacks their office this time, and starts pulling off Jaebum’s books from the shelves. Encyclopedias, novels, comics, nothing is safe from her snatching. She fills boxes and takes them away, but today she is slow, today she is cautious. She talks to Jinyoung quietly, and he murmurs back, though his eyes keep glancing back at his room where, under his pillow, the box awaits. 

“We don’t have to get rid of everything,” Jinyoung says. His mother shakes her head. She looks at him, her voice thorned, abrasive. Prickled with an anger that has no source -- a desperation. The defense of a mother, Jaebum realizes. 

“Yes, you do. I know you. You like to remember. You like to look back. It’s not healthy, sweetie. You’ll get lost in your thoughts.” 

A long silence stretches between them, and his mother turns back to the shelf. She pulls out books and Jinyoung has to identify them as either his or Jaebum’s. If it’s his, it stays. If it’s Jaebum’s, it disappears into a box and gets hauled away. Jinyoung lies most of the time, and Jaebum, standing next to him with his arms crossed, smiles each time he does. 

“Sometimes I feel him around,” Jinyoung mentions. 

His mother turns to him, wrinkles her nose. “What do you mean?” 

“Sometimes I feel like he’s around. I talk to him. Just out loud. Just if he’s there.” 

Her head tilts and her face looks heavy with sadness. She shakes her head. “Baby, there’s no such thing.” 

Now it’s Jinyoung’s turn to look sad, to look down, embarrassed and lonely. So much in fact that Jaebum stands beside him, leans close, puckers his lips together and blows gently against Jinyoung’s ear. 

The next time he looks at him, Jinyoung is smiling. 

\--

Outside, a car turns into the parking lot and its headlights fill the window of the room with a pale yellow. Jaebum watches the curtains flair with color, watches the light splash against the wall on the opposite end of the room. Then the car keeps turning, and the room goes dark. But Jaebum notices a small fragment of light in the corner of the window, thinks he hears it hiss. Slowly, it starts to sink and spread south, as if leaking into the room. 

The stream keeps growing until light drips down to the floor, falls in splashes. It starts to flood the room and bathes the shadows and crevices in bright colors. The wallpaper turns a glaring blue, the nightstand a bright, rich ochre. The sheets lighten to red as saturated as strawberries, and when he peeks over the edge of the bed, the floor is a lovely mixture of wood grain and greens. 

The light keeps rising and wading like water. It rises until the whole bed goes under, and soon the entire room is submerged in a sea of light. Jaebum looks around in awe of the colors, as bright as paintings, impossibly so, and then he turns to Jinyoung. He’s been awakened, perhaps by the light, perhaps by Jaebum’s stirring -- he isn’t sure of which possibility is more exciting. 

Jinyoung rubs at his eyes with small fists and Jaebum’s heart tightens. 

“You’re cute,” he whispers, as he tends to do, as he always has -- both in this world and the one before it. But the impossible happens and Jinyoung’s hands pause. He sits up, suddenly, and turns to Jaebum.

“Jaebum?” he croaks, his throat still asleep, his eyes swollen with dreams. Though they widen when they find Jaebum’s shape -- he looks at him from head to toe and Jaebum feels on fire, heat everywhere. He glances down at himself, the bright colors, the clear shape, the clarity of existing. His heart races, and he turns to Jinyoung and brushes his gaze over the pink curve of his lips, now pouted, confused, but pleased. He brushes his gaze over the slope of his shoulders as he tries to sit up, the sharp eyes, the round nose, every detail he’d fallen for -- every detail he falls for again, in that moment, with the light pressed up against them, painting everything in dazzling hues. 

This is a painting, he thinks, as he moves from side to side, makes sure that Jinyoung’s eyes follow his movement. 

“Is it you?” Jinyoung asks and Jaebum notices his eyes are wet, glistening, beautiful even in overwhelming tides of emotion. His eyelashes are wet, too, and Jaebum takes note, leans in so closely that he can see himself reflected in the brown of Jinyoung’s eyes. He decides, then, that there is nothing more beautiful, nothing more perfect than Jinyoung waking up, both horrified and elated that his late lover is alive again. That they have been reunited, just as he wished, just as Jaebum has wished, too. 

“You can see me?” Jaebum asks, scared, and Jinyoung nods quietly. Jaebum’s senses return, one by one, until he can smell the soap Jinyoung uses, its light scent wafting into his nose. He can feel Jinyoung coming closer, can see his eyes flit shut. He can hear the rustle and creak of the bed beneath them as they both lean forward and forward until Jaebum’s eyes close, too, and all he can do is taste Jinyoung’s lips, somewhere between salt and sugar, his tongue a medley of both. He kisses him until he’s breathless, until he’s sure that if he doesn’t pull away he’ll suffocate. And still he remains and clings to the sensation of Jinyoung’s lips because his life, again, returns to him. 

He pulls away, and when he opens his eyes the room is dark save for the quiet blue of dawn. Jinyoung has already left for work, and he learns, then, deprived of his senses, suspended in stale, unmoving air -- the air of tombs -- that even the dead dream. 

\--

He likes to pretend that he’s still alive, sometimes. That nothing has changed. That if he goes through the motions of living, maybe he’ll feel the ground beneath his feet again, or the shape of Jinyoung’s fingers tangled with his, the sigh of the breeze on him. Maybe Jinyoung will look at him again, will respond when Jaebum talks. 

Though he floats, he still lifts his legs, puts one foot in front of the other, pretends to walk Jinyoung to work like he used to. If he times it just right, if his legs move like he wants them to, if he places his hand near Jinyoung’s, it looks almost normal to him, this awkward charade. These strange steps tracing him back to life. He points out sights on the way to Jinyoung and imagines how he might react, whether he would laugh at the pigeon rustling on the bench, or whether he’d smile at the boy leading his grandmother into a store. 

Other times, when he gets bored of walking, he lets himself float in front of Jinyoung. He likes watching him, as his expression flutters from serious to nervous to happy in a matter of seconds. Each of these are brief, nothing more than echoes of emotion, but after so many years, Jaebum knows how to recognize them. 

Crowds of people make Jinyoung’s eyes go wide, and children make him smile. Rainy days make him slow and pensive and sunny ones put a bounce in his step. When Jinyoung’s usual path is closed for construction, Jaebum notices the panic that looms over him, and the longing when he has to wait for the lights to change so he can cross the street. 

He wonders what he longs for, what he thinks of. Jaebum moves around until Jinyoung is facing him, not intently but absently. Like he has one foot in a daydream, the other in Jaebum’s world. He stares into Jinyoung’s dark eyes, stares until the world around him disappears, only exists framed in long eyelashes, in the charming shape of his eyelids. He stares until he notices the way Jinyoung’s eyes light up, and he wonders if it’s recognition. 

If Jinyoung sees him, too. 

Jinyoung straightens up, takes a step forward, and Jaebum pretends to hold a breath. Maybe this time, he thinks, maybe this time he’ll be heard, maybe this time he’ll be seen. Maybe this time he’ll feel. 

But Jinyoung steps through him again and Jaebum realizes that the light has changed. Jaebum lingers where he stands, looks off into the distance. He’s not ready to keep walking with Jinyoung, so his eyes roam. 

Off in the bushes, next to a corporate building with high, dark walls and well-kept bushes, he sees himself. He’s only eight, it seems, and he’s excited over something. He bends over, then stands up again with tiny fists on his hips. Jaebum remembers that day. He’d spent it with his father in the garden, pulling out weeds, changing the soil, and planting seeds. It had been perfect, even if his father abandoned him and his mother four years later, then stopped talking to him when he turned eighteen and introduced Jinyoung as his boyfriend. 

He tries to step closer, and when he does, his double looks up at him. He sticks out his tongue, and when Jaebum takes another step in his direction, light bounces off the windows next to him in a bright flash and he disappears. 

\--

In the corner of the living room, on their windowsill, is a planter with dying flowers. 

It had been a present from Jaebum to Jinyoung, just a few months before he died. On Jinyoung’s birthdays, instead of an actual bouquet, Jaebum bought Jinyoung a pot of flower buds. Jinyoung, each time, would be disappointed, wouldn’t understand the sentiment. 

“I’m not a botany major like you, I don’t have a green thumb,” he would say, already mourning their loss.

Each time, Jaebum would respond, “It’s okay, we’ll grow them together.” 

And so each year, the flowers would die without ever having a chance at blossoming. But each year, Jaebum would gift Jinyoung another pot, and each year they would have another shot at growing. 

Jaebum sits in the corner, watching them. Each time he thinks of Jinyoung’s last birthday, it all comes back -- the pink of his sweater and the scattered shapes of sunlight dancing on it. The smell of fallen leaves, the wind in their hair, warm coffee nestled in their hands, bright birds and hushed whispers -- everything moving, everything in unrest, everything so utterly alive.

He wonders if other moments can come back as vividly so he moves to the middle of the living room and closes his eyes. He chooses one of his favorite memories: the night they met. 

He thinks about the party, the way Jinyoung, uptight and nervous, had tried to let loose and have fun. And he did, for a second, until he downed another drink, then another, and Jaebum, the calmer of the two, took it upon himself to make sure he got back to his dorm safely. 

For a second it returns: Jinyoung’s grip on his arm, his drunken laughter, his weight in Jaebum’s hold when he swings back and forth until he loses his balance and stumbles onto the grass in the middle of their university. 

“We’re almost there,” Jaebum says, offering his hand. But when Jinyoung takes it, he tugs Jaebum down with him. Jaebum falls on his bottom, sits up, and Jinyoung presses himself against his side. He takes hold of Jaebum’s arm, rubs his shoulder. 

“Do you want to kiss me?” he asks, looks at Jaebum with wide eyes. He looks scared, innocent, his lips pouty, his brow unsure. Jaebum shakes his head.

“Why not?" He gasps, looks close to crying. "Am I ugly?” 

“You’re cute, but you’re drunk. Maybe in the morning.” 

Jinyoung, looking pleased with the answer, smiles and lays himself over Jaebum’s lap. He looks up at him with half-open eyes. He runs his fingers through the side of Jaebum’s hair. 

“I’m not drunk,” he declares, tries to retain the few giggles that rattle in his throat. Jaebum smiles, too, as he looks down at him, smiles even when Jinyoung’s fingers run along his jaw, after they squeeze and pull on his cheeks. 

“You aren’t?” 

“No,” Jinyoung whispers loudly, basks in the dramatics of it all, “I’m just being funny. Aren’t I funny?” 

Jaebum looks down at him and their gazes tangle. There’s a spark in Jinyoung’s eyes that Jaebum recognizes vaguely, the same kind of spark that clatters up his spine and spills into his chest. Like tiny glowing embers that swirl around his heart and warm him. Jinyoung looks up at him with that same heat, and Jaebum imagines tiny fires behind his eyes, a glow that’s felt more than seen. A lovely, lovely feeling. 

“You’re hysterical,” Jaebum says, no louder than a whisper. 

He opens his eyes and he’s back in their living room. The ceiling fan twists quietly. For a second, Jaebum is sure he’s crying. When he touches his cheek with his finger, though, he feels no tears, no warmth, no cold. He feels nothing. 

\-- 

A year after his death, Jaebum no longer steps into direct light. 

Every time he does, he loses control of his body, as if he’s stepping into a current of water. As if he’s drowning in it. The first time it happens, he steps outside to walk with Jinyoung but the light pulls him slowly off the ground and towards a spot in the sky. He can almost hear it pulsing, like a mound of whispers calling out his name, not “Jaebum”, but a thick knot of tangled voices. He knows, deep inside, that they are calling him home, that he’s returning to wherever he came from. But each time, he claws his way into the shade, searches for the firm gravity of shadows. He swims frantically as the light gushes around him. 

He almost feels alive during these moments, and he thinks it’s cruel that this -- the panic of drowning, the helplessness and anxiety -- is what remains after life. That the most he’s felt in death is a surge of fear and the absurd phobia of dying a second time. 

Unable to leave the apartment during the day, he begins to roam into other apartments. He learns that the woman under them, the one that had always greeted them with a smile, has four kids and little time. The old man above them is divorced, but his ex-wife still comes over on Thursdays to make him dinner, and spends an hour watching television with him. Across the building, a woman has three cats with matching sweaters, and his favorite is the smallest, Nora, because she follows him with her eyes. 

Their next-door neighbor, though, is the most interesting discovery. He’s the same age as him and shares a favorite movie with Jinyoung, the one with a kiss under the rain in front of a flower shop, which Jinyoung had always wanted to recreate. The neighbor -- Wonpil, as Jaebum has figured out from reading his mail -- watches the movie every other day in the background as he goes over sheets of music. He works nights, usually, so Jaebum never had a chance to meet him when he was alive, never would have noticed him. And now he does nothing but watch him.

Wonpil plays the piano when he wakes up, no matter how drowsy or tired he is, and often falls asleep on the bench, hunched over and with his fingers still curved on the keys. He never eats out, always makes his food at home. Sometimes, when he’s running late, he won’t eat at all. His favorite books are mystery novels, and stacks of them line the side of his bedroom. He doesn’t own many things, but his apartment is always clean and pristine. 

It makes Jaebum wonder what his life is like beyond his apartment. If he has friends that love him, a mother that worries for him. If he plays the piano somewhere, if he teaches it, if he just plays as a hobby. He wonders if he’s ever been in love, if he feels lonely. 

When Jinyoung has trouble sleeping, Jaebum tells him stories about his neighbors.

“She brought dinner this time, apparently she had company at home. She still wanted to see him,” he says and Jinyoung moves on his back, then his side, then on his back again. 

“Would you do that? Keep seeing me, even if we weren’t together anymore?” 

Jinyoung shifts to lay on his side and faces the wall. Jaebum heaves a sigh and looks at the ceiling and squints, tries to look through it to peek into the old man’s room. Into his life full of waiting, full of wanting. He swallows, or at least pretends to swallow, and turns on his side, too. 

He traces the slope of Jinyoung’s frame with his eyes, the steady shoulders and slim waist. 

“Would you forget about me?” he asks. 

Silence settles in the room, then, quietly, Jinyoung’s snoring spills into the empty spaces. Jaebum gets up from bed and heads to the window and wishes morning would come faster. Then he catches a glimpse of movement in the corner of his eye, and when he turns, he sees himself walking up the hall. He is twelve, lanky, still short but growing. He looks worried. 

“Is he going to forget us?” he asks, and though she has no form, his mother’s voice floats into the hall. 

“No,” she says, “Of course not.”

A beat later, he vanishes and leaves Jaebum and Jinyoung alone in their room. Jaebum stares at the hallway until morning comes and pours light into puddles on the floor that break and scatter when Jinyoung leaves for work. 

\--

A few months after the anniversary of his death, Jinyoung stops believing. 

Jaebum lingers in a corner by the window, no longer bothers to stand upright. He floats, boundless, and sometimes forgets that he has a body at all. He feels closer to light, as if he can be everywhere at once, traveling instantly from place to place. 

He watches Jinyoung take out the box, fish out the rosary. Instead of praying, though, he holds it in a tight fist. Then his body trembles, not violently, but gently. When Jinyoung turns towards the window, Jaebum realizes he’s crying. 

It comes in waves, these emotions. For a few moments his body quakes, as if sobbing, and in the next, he just stares at the window with a blank gaze and loveless eyes. Because they are that: loveless. His worship of Jaebum isn’t love, he realizes, but pain -- no roses, just the prick of their thorns. 

Jinyoung steps closer to the window, then takes a step back. He looks unsure, more than ever. And then he lifts his hand and tosses the rosary out of the window. 

Jaebum follows its path and pokes his head out. A few inches below the window, he sees himself climbing down the side of the building. Though he can’t see them, he knows that his fingers, shorter then, are clinging to the vines that grew across his childhood home. He looks sixteen, and when the other him looks up, Jaebum notices how alive he looks. How full of love. He must be sneaking out to see his girlfriend, Jaebum thinks, and when he turns around, back into the room, Jinyoung is looking in his direction.

His eyes are fixed to a point in the distance beyond Jaebum, beyond this world, even. They look dull and lifeless. 

The more he notices the emptiness in Jinyoung’s gaze, the more he realizes how much he clings to his old life with him. He can go anywhere in death but he chooses to haunt these places. He refuses to accept his fate, and Jinyoung is left to hold on as tightly as Jaebum holds on to him.

So he decides to start letting go, little by little. 

\--

One morning, Jinyoung leaves for work as Jaebum watches from their living room. But the door never closes behind him. He thinks, at first, that Jinyoung has forgotten, but he is afraid to do anything -- he fears stepping into the light that comes in from outside. 

A beat later, his own voice rises up the stairs then sits at the doorstep. Slowly, he emerges from the light, twenty years old, wildly in love. Though he can’t see much else, he remembers the rest of memory clearly: Jinyoung and Jaebum have just bought a couch for their new apartment, and they’ve carried it up the stairs. But it proves too big for their door, so they spend an entire afternoon laying on it, eating dinner, watching videos on their phone, making out when nobody is around, always hoping they get caught.

Most of all, he remembers Jinyoung’s laughter. The way it rose in warm breaths, the way it lingered in the air, like a sweet summer heat. He was so free, then, and so in love. Jaebum watches himself sit down on the couch he can’t see, watches him kiss the boy that isn’t there. And when their eyes meet, the other Jaebum vanishes. 

That’s when Jaebum decides to set Jinyoung up on a date. 

Wonpil is the obvious choice -- a bit short, a bit awkward, but a nice match for Jinyoung. And though their schedules never overlap, Jaebum finds ways to have them meet. 

He knocks on Jinyoung’s door in early morning, loud enough that Jinyoung sits up in his bed, startled. Jaebum has stolen a piece of mail from their neighbor, has placed it in front of Jinyoung’s door. He’s planned it so that when Jinyoung, groggy and confused, still wearing only underwear, opens the door and goes to pick up the letter, Wonpil is making his way up the stairs. 

Jinyoung takes a step outside and Jaebum closes the door. He holds the knob shut, and Jinyoung struggles to turn it, rattles it with all his strength. Wonpil steps on the floor and asks, “Is everything okay?” 

Jinyoung flushes with color, looks nervous and panicked when he turns around. He stammers, he stutters, shakes his head. 

“I’m locked out,” he says and drops the letter on accident. Wonpil picks it up. His eyes widen when he reads his name.

“Are you stealing my mail?” he says, and Jinyoung turns a few shades darker. 

“It was in front of my door, I didn’t know it was yours -- I promise.” 

Wonpil glares for a few seconds, then his expression lightens and his features soften around a smile. 

“I’m Wonpil,” he says, “Your neighbor. But I guess you already know that.” 

Jinyoung, smiling, finally notices he isn’t dressed, that his hair is still messy, that his eyes are probably swollen, his cheeks bloated. He opens his mouth to speak, but his words come after a pause, delayed and timid. 

“I’m Jinyoung,” he says. Jaebum pulls his hand away and Jinyoung almost falls with how hard he turns the knob. Wonpil laughs and Jinyoung manages a shy smile. 

“It was nice meeting you,” he says, then steps inside his apartment, closes the door behind him. Though he berates himself quietly, Jinyoung smiles when he leans back against the door and slides down to sit on the floor. Then, as if aware of himself, he tries to contain his smile, looks left, then right. Only when he knows he’s alone does he smile again, wider this time, enough that gums poke out from his lips, enough that his eyes thin and the wrinkles Jaebum fell in love with appear. Jaebum has to stop himself from reaching forward to touch them. 

“You like him,” Jaebum says when Jinyoung stands up slowly and walks back into the room, light on his feet. He can almost make out the sound of Jinyoung’s heart pounding against his chest. 

A month unfolds this way, with their early morning meetings. Sometimes Jinyoung pulls on a bathrobe, sometimes he pretends he’s been dressed for hours, though Jaebum watches him pull on nice pants and a nice shirt in a rush. Sometimes it’s Wonpil that Jaebum wakes up so Wonpil can see Jinyoung off in the mornings in boxers and an old band t-shirt. Sometimes they compliment each other’s clothes, sometimes Wonpil brings Jinyoung coffee and sometimes Jinyoung gives Wonpil pastries he buys from his favorite bakery. Every time, Jinyoung smiles a bit wider. Every time, that smile lasts a bit longer. 

And after another month, Jinyoung no longer pulls out his Jaebum box to pray. 

\--

Jaebum stops pretending to be alive. He no longer cares. 

Instead, all his focus goes to setting Wonpil and Jinyoung up. The thought of Jinyoung dating again reminds Jaebum of all the things that made him fall for Jinyoung in the first place: his smile, his eyes, the eagerness in his voice when speaking about photography. How nervous he was, how timid he still is. The curl in his lip when he teases, the shrug on his shoulders when he lies -- the little dance he does when he’s about to eat chicken and the way he closes his eyes when he’s sad, as if hiding. How stubborn he is, how hotheaded, how gentle, too. All of these things that make a person, that made him fall in love again and again for six beautiful years. 

Wonpil doesn’t stand a chance.

Almost two years after his death, eight years from when they’d first met, Jinyoung is going to have an exhibition of his own. He finally has enough pieces for a gallery show, and nature photography, surprisingly, is on the rise. They print out test posters and Jinyoung keeps a single copy. Every night, before he sleeps, he pulls it out of a binder and stares at it with his head cocked, lips twisted into a smile, eyes wide like a child who’s been granted a wish. 

When he sleeps, Jaebum pulls it out from the binder, and though he can’t feel it, he’s sure his heart is light and airy, as though it’s been stuffed with cotton, as though Jinyoung’s happiness is his own as well. As though they share a single heart. He looks up to where Jinyoung sleeps. He’s so proud, he wonders if Jinyoung knows. 

The next time Wonpil and Jinyoung meet, Jaebum makes sure to lock the door from the inside so Jinyoung struggles with getting it open. He still carries his stack of papers from work in one arm while the other trembles as he tries to twist the metal handle. Soon, Wonpil makes his way up and, as if routine, they turn around to greet each other. 

“You should talk to someone about that door,” Wonpil says.

“I don’t know what’s wrong. I think it’s your fault, it always happens when you’re here.” 

“Maybe you’re just pretending it’s locked so you can say hi. It’s okay, Jinyoung, you don’t have to pretend.” 

Jinyoung blushes and shakes his head, but he smiles when he looks away and fiddles with the door some more. Jaebum, stepping closer, pinches his fingers around the single poster that peeks out from the binder he holds. He tugs it out in one stroke, lets it flutter in the air, swaying gently over to Wonpil. He picks it up. When Jinyoung notices, his eyes widen, but it’s too late.

“So you’re a photographer,” he says and Jinyoung swallows.

“I guess you could say that,” Jinyoung manages, “Nature photography. Mostly insects. Nothing pretty or anything.” 

“And you’re having a show.” 

“Yeah, my first,” Jinyoung says. He no longer rattles the door, no longer moves. Jaebum watches each of his breaths clammer through him. He wonders if Jinyoung’s palms feel sweaty. 

“And you weren’t going to tell me?” 

“It’s not anything special -- I mean, you’re welcome to come. It’s just -- I’m not sure if that’s something you like.” 

“Of course, I’m a man of the arts,” Wonpil says, “But I only want to go if I can treat the photographer to some food after.”

Jinyoung pauses. He looks nervous and hesitant, but eventually that melts away. For the first time in two years, he seems happy. No sting, no pain, no guilt. Sheer joy -- timid and charming and vibrant. Bliss that leaks from the wrinkles under his eyes, from the quiet curve of his smile, from his dark, roaming eyes that avoid Wonpil’s confident smile. 

“Sure,” he says, finally. Then, “I would like that.” 

“It’s a date!” 

That night, Jinyoung doesn’t sleep for hours, not because he’s crying, not because of nightmares. Every few minutes he sits up and stares across the room, and Jaebum knows Jinyoung is looking in the direction of Wonpil’s apartment. When he finally falls asleep, Jaebum presses an ear against his stomach. He swears he can hear the butterflies fluttering around in there, flapping their wings, eating away at Jinyoung’s sorrow. 

And just like the first night they’d met, eight years ago, stumbling into the grass, Jinyoung drunk and Jaebum painfully sober, he recognizes the glow of love settling inside of Jinyoung. 

\--

While Wonpil gets ready in his apartment, Jaebum watches Jinyoung fuss over what he should wear and what looks best. He goes into the bathroom more times than he can count, and fixes his hair more than he needs to. 

“You look fine,” Jaebum says from the bed, “He’s going to fall for you right away.” 

He laughs when Jinyoung trips outside the room, smiles when Jinyoung lingers too long by the door and takes a few deep breaths before he opens it carefully, locks it just as slowly. Then he knocks on Wonpil’s door.

When it opens, Jaebum sees it in Wonpil’s eyes: that burst of sparks, a flame starting to kindle. Love starting to swirl with promise in his eyes. 

“See,” Jaebum says, “He’s already crazy for you.”

Wonpil drives them with Jinyoung leading quietly from the passenger seat. They chatter about nothing, but still they smile, still they laugh. The car is full of youth and quiet energy. Light, sweet. Glowing. But Jaebum has planned ahead. Near the middle of their trip, Jaebum floats forward, in front of their car, and cleanly pulls out some wires so the car shuts down. With propulsion alone, Wonpil manages to park the car. The air tenses.

“What the fuck,” he mutters.

“What’s wrong?” Jinyoung asks.

“I don’t know.” He tries to start the car again, but nothing happens. Not even a click.

“Did something happen?” 

“It doesn’t start,” he groans, “I’m sorry, Jinyoung.”

He looks stressed, his knuckles tight around the steering wheel. Jinyoung reaches over, rests a hand against his arm. The air in the car loses its heaviness. 

“Don’t worry,” he tells him, “We can walk.” 

And so they walk. Four blocks forward, one block the right. Then two to the left. They walk fast, rushed only by their own excitement. Sometimes they walk in silence, sometimes they laugh, but throughout Jinyoung smiles widely, the smile Jaebum recognizes, the smile he’s missed. But three blocks from finding the gallery, Jaebum reaches out and pokes Jinyoung’s shoulder so he stops, suddenly. He turns around, expecting to find the person responsible but he finds no one. Wonpil turns around. 

“What’s up?” 

“Sorry, I thought someone grabbed me.”

“Maybe a ghost,” Wonpil says and Jinyoung smiles.

By then, Jaebum has gone upwards, floated until he can reach for the sprinklers lining the top of the flower shop. He pulls them roughly, with all of his strength, until they rip open and water pours out in thick, glimmering ropes. With his fingers, he messes with the water so it falls, scattered, like rain. Drops crash against Jinyoung’s shoulders and Wonpil’s hair and the ground between them. 

They both look up and read the sign.

They both say, “This reminds me of a movie.” 

They both turn to each other. 

They both smile. 

Jaebum lowers himself next to them to watch magic blossom.

“This is the scene where they kiss, finally,” Wonpil says. Jinyoung tries to look away but it’s hard when Wonpil is framed in small sprays of water, glittering, glowing. He must look dreamy, Jaebum thinks, just as dreamy as Jinyoung looks. Angelic, even. 

“It’s like rain,” Jinyoung says and Wonpil nods. The rest goes unspoken. Jinyoung takes a single step forward, Wonpil’s hand finds his shoulder. The other finds his hip. They lean in gently, moving to each other like planets pulled by gravity, a slow, steady process, a movement that has a definite end. That only needs to be waited for, never noticed, never found. Only felt and followed. 

Their noses rub against each other, then Jinyoung’s eyes close. Jaebum notices that Wonpil takes a second to close them too, probably dazzled by the sight of Jinyoung so close. 

He wishes he could feel this, he thinks, and before he can stop himself, Jaebum lowers himself into Wonpil’s body, takes up the space he takes. He places his hands where Wonpil’s are, looks at Jinyoung from his angle. Then he closes his eyes and leans forward, tries to find Jinyoung’s lips through touch alone.

For a moment he feels the heavy drops of water crashing against his shoulder, the cool, wet slide of makeshift rain down his neck. The wet shirt clinging to his back, the breeze whistling around them. He feels Jinyoung warm under his fingers, soft even when he’s stiff and nervous. He feels his nose pressed against his own, rubbing quietly as their lips meld together. As the warm, the wetness, the quiet breaths that manage to escape into the spaces between them finally settle in his senses. He swears he hears the stars above them, crackling with energy. Swears he hears the ground beneath them, shifting them along, spinning endlessly in orbit. 

He swears he feels Jinyoung’s lips on his own one last time, the same hesitation, the same excitement, the same love they spent six years discovering.

When he pulls away, Jinyoung is looking at him with a smile. His eyes are wide open, and the streetlights glimmer over them, strike every eyelash, look like stars that fall from the sky to swim in his gaze. His features look round and lovely, and Jaebum feels like he’s home. 

And over Jinyoung’s shoulder, he sees a motorcycle speeding past. The rider has his jacket, his helmet, even his backpack. In a second, he’s already turning right, heading for the highway.

“Let’s go,” Wonpil says, noticing the time, “Or we’ll be late.” 

Then Wonpil and Jinyoung start walking towards the gallery. Jaebum goes to follow but he doesn’t move, he can’t move. The more they walk away, the more Jaebum struggles until he notices tiny flecks of light floating in front of him, like glowing drops of water, rising higher and higher. Small bits of sunlight returning to the sky. It’s only one at first, but soon there’s three, then six, then a tiny galaxy. He reaches up to touch them and that’s when he notices that the tips of his fingers are glowing. They glow so bright that he can no longer make out details, only their outline melting slowly into the air.

When he looks down, most of his lower body is gone, though there is no pain attached to the moment. Only peace, safety. Only bliss.

He looks over to where Jinyoung is walking with Wonpil, holding his hand, leaning close to him. When his shoulders glow and start unraveling into tiny, shining droplets, Jaebum shouts, one final call, one final attempt at being heard. 

“Park Jinyoung!” he yells, smiling, for once feeling the tears on his cheeks and around his lips, leaking down to his chin, then floating up with the rest of him, “You’re hysterical!” 

Jinyoung stops walking. Wonpil stops, too, and Jaebum sees Jinyoung start to turn around. 

Then the world goes white. 

\--

“What’s up?” Wonpil asks, “Are you alright?” 

Jinyoung pauses, his neck turned, his entire frame twisted. He searches in the dark, empty street. The water no longer pours, becoming, instead, a small trickle that slides down to wall to feed a puddle on the sidewalk. 

“I just thought I heard someone calling me.” 

“Do you want to go back and check?” 

“No,” he says, turning back to Wonpil. His eyes are teary, but he smiles. “I’ll see him later.” 


End file.
